It Takes More Than Just The Soul
by CrypticCharmander
Summary: Set in the beginning of "Sink or Swim! The Men who Transcend the Gods?" of the 4th season of the English dubbed Anime, we discover an underlying secret lurking within the jungles of the Amazon. As our godly sight as viewers grants us, our attentions are brought to a new perspective of the happenings in the Soul Eater universe. (See Author profile for full Description and details)


[ Location: Babba Yaga's Castle ]

It had started...

"It's **up to us** now."

"I'm the one who's going to **surpass god** , remember?"

"No, it won't... I can't sit here and let that happen."-

"As a **Grim Reaper** I will protect this world."

Three Meisters and their weapons race against madness. There is no time for mistakes, or trip ups, if they do not make it into the Kishin's protective dome before it finishes forming... their world might as well be over at this moment. Maka Albarn with her weapon, the scythe, Soul Eater Evans. BlackStar and his weapon, the dark arm, Tsubaki Nakatsukasa. Death The Kid Shinigami the reaper with his two weapons, the twin pistols, Liz and Patty Thompson. All attempting to reach the same goal in mind. Defeat the Kishin, Asura.

"Gahh! No!" Someone screamed in anger within the thick jungle. A large flock of birds scattered from the nearby trees."This cannot be pawsible! This is a complete nightmare! How could we have even let this get this far?! Why would Lord Death go against the plans he created for all of us? We followed them as hard as we could! And yet he's letting those kids walk all over them!? This doesn't make any sense."

GreenPaw, a loud mouthed, young teenager. A girl who relied more on her sass and brute strength than her smarts when things needed to be done fast. Despite her feverous attitude, she is considered royalty. Being the daughter of the leaders of a well-protected and hidden South American native tribe, located in the deep Amazon jungles of Brazil. The Tribe was given the name Hiedra by the Spanish explorers of 1701-1774 ,who named it after the ivy like tattoos decorating the arms of the two leaders of the tribe at the time. Although called by the older inhabitants as Reino da Besta Alma Pessoas, it is more commonly referred to now as Ivy.

She had a black wolf paw print tattooed on her left shoulder, which was missing a toe (having only three in total). Her outfit consisted of a dark brown cloth bikini styled bottoms connected at each side of her hips by a gold ring, and a dark brown, thin-strapped bra like top connected at the center by a gold star charm. Her body was quite curvy and pear shaped, with slightly wider than average hips and muscly thick thighs. Bust was a C and her belly a tad bit pudgy. GreenPaw's arms appeared very strong but hands small and dainty.

GreenPaw's name, like tribal tradition, was very obvious. Obvious in the way that it makes sense when compared to her appearance. Her hair, which was thick and a little grown out of a pixie bob with fluffier bangs, and eyes are both a bright, light catching green.

Children are taken immediately to the elders to be tattooed, once they're born, with what the spirits and ancestors of the jungle have told them to be marked with. Once those hours long process is done they are handed back to their parents. The first things that come to the parent's minds is usually what becomes their names. The traditional lifestyles and beliefs of the tribe make the community very simple and rather peaceful inside the boarders of their land.

GreenPaw's size matched her temper; she stood at about 4'11. Which didn't affect her intimidation skills. Her social relations were very much effected by the local stories of discrimination. In addition, because so she has already had her ignorant mind set about how the world is... despite only being 14; GreenPaw takes stereotypes seriously and because of that, she might be very quick to judge others who are not a part of her her tribe, everyone is family and outsiders are usually considered a threat. Very literally, GreenPaw will defend herself with bite and bark, which, depending on who you are may both be as equally painful.

"GreenPaw-"a soft, yet very concerned, voice spoke from behind the raging tribe's member. "You know this isn't Lord Death's fault, certainly not those kid's. Stop yelling. Everything that has happened beforehand was and is meant to have been. No changing it now. I-I'm sure things will be fine. Those kids are the D.W.M.A's best students, give them some faith. Besides, Asura couldn't possibly be that hard to beat."

An Angel Daten-shi, an angel who possesses the capability of great power, though she cannot control hardly any of it yet. So young, being the same age as GreenPaw, she suffers from the great stresses produced by being forcibly pushed into responsibilities and missions she is not sure she can handle yet. An constantly wonders how it could have possibly been so much better to send her down from her old home in Haven to Earth so soon, her training isn't complete, how could someone like her help instead of only get in the way? Unknowingly, it is because her superiors believe she is important and is far ahead of her training. Way more important and advanced than she believes she ever will be; as she is supposed to be. She is supposed to be perfect for her natural duties, because An Angel is a Fallen Angel. The angel with the blue halo. The servant and willing slave to the reaper, this of course, including the Shinigami family.

All angels are born for specific purposes. And they are categorized into four main separate groups. There are The Before Angels, more officially known as Arch Angels, they were created before any other life forms existed on Earth excluding the evil Leviathan. The more known and famous Arch Angels would be Uriel, Samael, Michael, and Sataniel. Angels like these have not been seen since or heard from since Biblical times, and due to lack of substantial evidence some rumor they either never existed or have disappeared completely off the face of the Earth. Even within the Angel community, their lack of presence has been enough to turn the history of their supposed great and holy existence into myth and rumor.

Then there are the more peaceful and simple living angels, more humanoid like in characteristics and physical form known as Guardian Angels. These angels have distinctive yellow halos and are born shortly after their Other is, they tend to be the opposite of the biological sex of their Other, and it is believed they are perfect matches of and for their Other. Perfect matches to be your best friend, helper, guide, protector, even lover. Your Guardian Angel is born with the hard-wired instinct to protect you, and love you unconditionally even if you do not feel you deserve their love even if you tell them not to. The Guardians will protect their Others with their lives. It is not a want, it is a need. Something they cannot control or turn off. They understand how you feel, so much so that they can tell when you are in trouble, like an internal connection similar to a gut feeling. However, there are restrictions. Your Guardian, who lives in Haven, cannot just help you and see your life's progress down on Earth. They cannot come down and save you from just anything that may harm you or effect you negatively. It takes a lot of energy moving that far and fast. They only gain the strength to protect you when you are in life and death situations, similar to how an old woman can gather up the sudden strength to lift a car up off a young child in a split moment's notice. A burst of adrenaline and tightly packed, untapped sources of magic releasing at the same moment assists their transport and gives them strength. Most Guardian Angels do not survive their first trip to Earth, stopping a car from hitting your soft human body with their own is only one of the many ways a Guardian's life is lost in the line of duty. The ones who do make it back can often become traumatized depending on the situation they came back from.

Sometimes, a yellow haloed angel can naturally live longer than their Other while living in Haven. Alternatively, maybe they lived but failed at saving their Other. If their Other was truly horrible and when passed their soul was sent to Hell or Purgatory, their soul's light will eventually diminish and turn black like smoke, which is how demons are created. When an angel's Other half transforms into a demon, their own souls are also affected. They live to serve and protect their Other so naturally once their Others turn evil their angel will follow suit and their soul will become affected as well... The Guardian angel is no longer angelic and will obey their demonic Other's commands. The most significant sign of telling when a Guardian Angel has turned is that their yellow halo will become as red as Hell fire. These angels are cast away from Haven and the angel community and usually roam Earth's more dangerous and secluded locations or remain trapped in Hell/Purgatory with their Other. These angels have never obtained any official names due to how the angelic community wishes to ignore and dismiss their existence, but they are commonly called Hell Angels or Red Angels for obvious reasons.

The last angel type would be the Fallen Angel. These are basically the same as Guardian Angels except they are born to protect their reaper (just as a Guardian is born for their Other), preserve balance, and help soul's crossover to the right place. Fallen Angels are often mistaken for Red Haloed Angels, for those are more common on Earth. They have nicknames like Reaper's Angel, Black Angel, and Blue Angel. You can tell a Fallen Angel from the others by the halo color and wing color, only Fallen Angels have blue halos and black wings.

This is the reason why An Angel shows so much likeness to Death The Kid, for she is his Fallen Angel and was born in his image. Her hair is long and black and there is three horizontal white stripes in it, but on the left not the right. Her eyes were made up of rings of silver and grey, and her height the same as Kid's about 5'5. She wore a suit tailored to look exactly like his. She achieved mimicking him very well minus the few missing details like the Skull accessory having a blue halo and that her rings where small pairs of silver wings. She was born perfectly for him; it all comes down to that in the end, even though she does not think she's perfect enough.

An's biggest mental challenges isn't like any of Kid's obsessive compulsive tendencies to make things symmetric, her's are the major lack of confidence in herself. All angels are born perfect for their other half but she does not think she is, the major reasons being the differences in her physical appearance. Her hair grows too fast, she can't keep it short like his, the stripes in her hair are on the wrong side, her eyes are the wrong color, she doesn't actually care if things are symmetric and is horrible at faking like she cares about symmetry; for a small while An even tried binding her B sized breasts to make her chest flatter to appear more masculine- more like Kid. In the society of Haven every angel is rumored to look exactly like their Other,be exactly like their other and Fallen Angels are the only Angels who get to see what their Other looks like before they leave. In fact,everyone knows what the current reapers of Earth look like, the past ones as well. And their achievements and skills are broadcasted constantly, for they are like celebrities and idols to the angel kind. An had been ridiculed all her life by her peers for not looking exactly like her reaper. She felt like she was broken and still does.

Her voice is Mezzo-Soprano, has a dark and cool weight to it and when more relaxed can sound light and airy. There is no distinct accent. Right now she sounded rather quiet and worried, for obvious good reasons. There was a sort of far away tension in her stare.

"You're just acting so calm because your precious little reaper boy is in there with them. Surely, the good will prevail with his wisdom and strength, the mighty Death The Kid!" A tree branch shook slightly as a girl sat there mocking and teasing An, using an extremely rude and insensitive amount of sarcasm. Some leaves fell down below onto a boy who sat at the base of the trunk. She smiled, she even seemed possibly drunk.

The harlot laughed at her own joke, letting herself lean back enough to almost fall backwards off the branch but tightened her grip to prevent that from happening.

She wore dark red daisy dukes, a shoulder-less yellow top with additional double black shoulder straps; the yellow top had a graphic like design of a large blue splatter on the front with three red Monster Energy™ like claw marks over that. Her hair was white but she tried covering most of it up with cheap hair dye; light purple, dark blue, and red. These colors frequently faded out and she would have to redo it a lot, because of this, her hair was also quite damaged with split ends and straw-like texture, appearing fried. She had her hair up in very high red ponytails, and her fried hair made it a little past her shoulder. Lately she has been keeping the red and blue streaks in her messy bangs and violet ones in her pigtails. She stood out from An's professional look and she was undeniably trying too. Even GreenPaw's shockingly scarce amount of clothing seemed less attention grabbing then the vibrant assault-on-the-eyes this young, substance abusive, girl had on.

Her is name is Jackalin De'Ville. No, not that creative. She admits that her first name isn't even spelled "correctly". However, that is what you get when a child picks out their own name at a very young age, and then stubbornly sticks with it.

Jackalin's voice has a nasally tone, sounds obnoxiously bratty most of the time, but can easily become cool and melancholy when she chooses (which isn't often). Her vocal range would probably be put into Mezzo-Soprano.

Jackalin stood up wobbling a bit and moved down on the branch walking toward the trunk, then, while jumping down, shook more leaves out of the tree.

Revealed more by the light a long, stereotypical demon like tail appeared from hiding behind her back and not-so-sharp red demon horns could be observed poking out from the top of her head- in front of her pony tails. Jackalin's eyes were both red, but her right eye had a circled star in it. However, with these very striking features she appeared perfectly human besides that.

Her most disturbing feature, perhaps besides behavior, was that it appeared that her soul had gone missing. When trying to look at her soul, like any Meister would, they would only see a shell of ancient letters and characters in the shape of her body. So far it has been impossible for the average Meister to even feel her presence spiritually from even close ranges of 10 to 15 ft. Any further and she appeared undetectable, spiritually.

"Well, he is my reaper. It'd be against my nature not to have faith in him, I can't help that. . ." An thought, actually being a bit hurt by Jackalin's rude comment.

"That doesn't help anything right now, Jackalin!" GreenPaw got in between them. Jackalin felt no remorse about the teasing, it was just a joke- you could see it in her face that she wasn't sorry. GreenPaw continued, "We need to get settled what we're going to do now, you know, once they do fail. How are we going to get inside that thing?! It looks completely sealed shut from here; I don't see any more openings, do you? We'll need some magic, a witch's work. Somethin' like that." She crossed her arms, lowering her head a bit in thought. " We could always charge the thing, though, it wouldn't hurt. I bet I could put a crack or two in it's shell."

An, too, thought quietly to herself about this; witches are not actually that hard to find; especially now with the madness pulsating so strong around the world- though she did not actually want to agree with GreenPaw's idea. And she even more strongly apposed charging the structure. Every little part of her being wanted to try to help those trapped students, and especially Kid since it is her job, but she was given orders by Lord Death... orders given by a reaper needs to be followed unless her own says otherwise, and she's never even once spoken to another reaper before, not even Kid . He doesn't even know she exists. There where no loop-holes in Lord Death's instructions. She could not go and help Kid unless she was sure he would die without her help, and from here it was impossible to tell.

"Well, fine. Our orders where to not get involved with D.W.M.A students but I do suppose it is wise to create a backup plan... in case something goes wrong." She decided on saying, even though An very well knew she would be physically unable to help if the chance arose.

"For if we ever get in, do we go with our original battle plans?" A large, muscular boy said, as he appeared right in front of them, his scale like chameleon skin smoothing out to a natural reddish brown, he stood at 6'1 and right beside GreenPaw.

"We're going to do exactly what I said before we got here. Camo, I want you and GreenPaw to focus on your own natural abilities more than your partnered weapon techniques."

Camo the Multi-Tribal weapon, weapon to GreenPaw, one of the many Tribal technicians. Also being a born member of the Ivy tribe. His father and mother were both great, loyal and trustworthy, personal friends to GreenPaw's parents- and had both set up the partnership before GreenPaw was even born. Regardless of the personal relations of their parents, Camo would have still become partners with GreenPaw just like Camo's father had been GreenPaw's Father's weapon. His long line of family ancestors have always guarded the next heirs to become leaders, and continued to do so even after they had become leaders, as far back as the tribe can remember; this being one of the many strict traditions they follow.

Camo is 3 years older than GreenPaw, with dark brown, grown out from shaved short hair. He has spiked it up in the front. The sclera of his eyes are yellow and the iris are red and reptilian like.

Camo's voice is smooth, calming, and tenor. Unlike GreenPaw's which is like a Soubrette; with a thick and heavy timbre, although she is able to quickly – and does so frequently - bring it back up to a bright and light, excitable one. Both Camo and GreenPaw have light Brazilian accents, but it has been changed slightly by the influence of traveling to other locations. On Camo's right arm was a black Large Lizard Tattoo (similar to a stereotypical tribal gecko tattoo), with a rounded leaf gripped in its tail. He only wears a pair of US-styled Jungle camouflage cargo pants, which look baggy, used and are made from thick material.

"Asura isn't prepared to battle anything like us; to his knowledge only human weapon and Meister pairs are coming after him, besides Lord thinks that the D.W.M.A is his only obstacle. No other Reaper or witch seems to be taking on this challenge; we have the opportunity to catch Asura off guard. Our kind might have been more common to see back then, when Asura was a part of Lord Death's team, but we have grown individually as species over all this time, stayed hidden away from the sights of others and gained more knowledge about the outside world and ourselves! We can finally have the upper hand!" An Angel went on while placing her fist in her other hand, aiding the rally she was creating to keep the other's positive energy flowing. An continued, " This has always been our goal. We have a chance to be known again. Which means I also want you, Jackalin and Mike to use more of the surprise tactics we worked on. Domanick, Dustin, and I will be following in this pattern as well."

The boy, who sat at the base of the tree Jackalin jumped down from, crossed his arms and tucked in his legs as he rested his chin forward. Looking attentive but seeming to just not care as much. His hair color was a very dull brown, and his eyes a light blue. He wore a button up dress shirt, the left side was black and the right was white with large red stitching in the split down the middle of his back, with the collar popped up. His jeans where light blue and fading in places. Torn at the bottom, as if he had worn them out by stepping on them with the back of his heels; these pants used to be too large for him at one point but since then he had grown into them and become a bit tight. Mike slightly nodded his head at what An was saying.

Demon Scythe, Mikhail De'Moin, weapon partner to Jackalin De'Ville the melodic scythe Meister.

Like Jackalin, Mike had stereotypical demonic horns, and a devil's tail similar to her's as well. His left blue eye was different than his right though, in his pupil was a star; opposite of Jackalin's. Mike's soul also appeared to be missing, and looking through a spiritual vision, you can only see a shell of his body made up in glowing blue ancient characters.

Jackalin and Mike are very different from each other, their aura hardly resonates, and their partnership seemed incredibly forced (because it is). Mike acts and looks quite, plain and analytical... but Jackalin's so rude, disrespectful, loud mouthed and ornery. They do have some other things in common, though, like their similar strange appearances and large egos. They are both dominants but Jackalin is more aggressively so.

Suddenly, the air around them filled with tacky, pink and yellow smoke. It was ironic given the surrounding and what all was happening.

"Ugh, please, not here, not now- this isn't the time for any of your games and tricks!" An cried out openly, unsure of what direction to yell at. Two pairs of sparkling eyes caught the other's attention, as if this was normal, and An grumbled as the smoke enveloped her completely. If it was not for all the madness vibrating in the air, or the fact that Armageddon was on the rise, this sudden show might be a bit enjoyable. Mysterious, foggy and soft rose petals seemingly fell from around the now dissolving, splendorous smoke cloud. And two tall older boys stood at each side of An Angel, each holding a burgundy colored rose in their hand.

Where did the smoke come from, the petals, the two boys? Questions,mysteries and wonders. It's all about presentation! Presentation and pleasing the audience. One of the two, which, didn't follow through as well as planned by the performers...

"An! You spoiled the show! Where did your spirit go!? What happened to that awe-struck child we once met in the back of the beautiful streets, in the beautiful City of Angels?" said the one on her right. Both boys were considerably handsome, and looked almost exactly alike apart from hairstyles and slight eye shape. With all the smoke gone now, and the mysterious petals seeming to have melted into thin air, An looked at the one on the Left and placed her hands on her hips.

"It's almost like you two have seemed to have forgotten how serious of trouble we're in."

" No-no, we haven't forgotten." The one on the left said.

"Oh?"

"We're just trying to lighten up the mood is all."

The EdgeWood Twins, Domanick and Dustin. Both proud-to-be demon revolvers. Boastingly and specifically they like to explain they are blue steeled model, 29 .44 Magnum, revolvers. Detailed with Renaissance period style angelic accents on the frame, cylinder and barrel. Complementing the two's weapon forms and tastes are the 24 karat gold plated hammer, trigger, side plate skull shaped screws, cylinder release and cylinder release screw.

Standing at about as tall as Camo in human form and wearing matching, expensive looking purple suits; complete with dark velvet purple top hats (of course- being the classy boys they are). Their pampered look seemed to make them drip with the image of money. However, they aesthetically matched An Angel quite nicely.

Domanick which stood to An's left had straighter hair then his brother's and his eyes where slightly more almond shape. Dustin's where more rounded and his hair a bit curly. Both naturally beach blonde, and eyes dark as the surfing blue sea. Their skin would have been extremely pale if it was not for their Cali tans.

Safe to assume, the two came from a very privileged household. Unfortunately, for the twins, they no longer have as much access to that kind of life.

Because of the twin's unhealthy spending habits and their mother's new sour divorce arrangements, which happened to be the fourth in her life, their large estate went into foreclosure. Which forced the EdgeWood's to sell the last of the family's small chain of businesses and factories.

Cut off from what they had left by their mother the two began to live in the streets of Los Angeles, while she moved to a new much smaller (yet luxurious) home in the more suburban side of town.

And what was the EdgeWood family business? The production and distribution of fake AND real magical games, magician illusions, and other trickery items and guides. This would explain their grand entrance.

Although they get on her nerves a lot, An Angel couldn't be more grateful to have them as her go-to partners. Domanick enjoys organizing An's daily schedules, her desk, even her closet and daily outfits- he can't help himself when it comes to clothes. While Dustin is more spontaneous and can usually distract An from her stressful life by setting up fun things to do every now and again or by simply just being plain distracting- he can assure that there could be some fun found anywhere. Spending time with the both of them is certainly never boring... but almost always a little exhausting.

Domanick took a deep breath and looked at An, while still holding his rose, twisting it by the stem between his thumb and pointer finger. Glancing up from staring at it, he spoke, "Fine- well. Since you were all on the topic earlier, what about Kana's part in this play? We should definitely go over that, it is her first time back in this sort of field since... you-know-what happened." he suddenly hushed his tone.

"Yeah! You said everyone would be working together, we brought her with us- where is she?" Dustin asked innocently and absentmindedly.

"You two really can be so damn dense some times." GreenPaw chimed in, as the other's body language grew suddenly more worried.

Dustin messed with his rose for a moment, and then looked up. "What do you mean by that?"

Then it hit Domanick, and the realization sunk to the bottom of his gut. The rose in his hand drooped and he looked a bit paler in appearance.

"Dammit, Dustin! We lost Kana!" He said, suddenly gripping his brother's collar.

"Oh shit!" Dustin said as the boys both broke down, and now the roses in their hands started to fade away.

Domanick and Dustin also sounded and dealt with things differently. Usually under pressure, Domanick remained calm unless messing up in front of a crowd or "audience". He locks up when embarrassed or frightened. His tenor voice usually sounds serious and well controlled; he can make typically anyone feel like he knows what he is doing. Dustin always pushes things off as if they're not a big deal unless a personal great friend is involved, and most of his solutions to problems are childish or not too well thought out- he can get a bit too emotional at times. Because of this people see Dustin as more of a fun loving child rather than someone to go to if there is trouble and Domanick viewed as the mature intelligent adult who could be trusted with just about anything. Dustin is a perfect countertenor to his brother, and his voice is unusually light for a man's but powerful when needed.

"You both were supposed to keep an eye on her because she had been falling behind on the trail early on, then all three of you disappeared for a while so here we all thought you were hanging back together to let Kana rest. But instead you spent all that time trying to throw a little display, for no real reason but kicks and now we're short a team mate!" An said with disappointment and a surprisingly large amount of anger, she turned away from them and rubbed her temples.

About a mile away in a deeper, thicker portion of the jungle, a young, worried, and very lost girl made her way through the underbrush. Stepping down from a rotting, wet log to a lower section of the ground, she grabbed a slippery and mossy branch by mistake. Slipping backwards onto some briery like sticker bushes and vines, becoming trapped.

"Ouch..." She said quietly as she tried to figure out how to get back up. But it was too difficult. She couldn't find a safe place to put her hands down to help push her up, and the thorns had started to already get stuck in the bottom and back of her black dress.

Kana Hope, the newest member to An's field team, and someone who really shouldn't be going on missions at all. She slowly started to become panicked. Lying there, she breathed heavily, looking back and forth for something to grab to help pull herself back madness was so thick in the air it would almost seem that you could slice it with a blade. "Is it like this everywhere?" She thought. Kana pulled her arms close to her chest, hugging herself, realizing she would have to wait for someone to come rescue her.

The others aren't actually that far away, but in this dense and dark place, anyone would be hard to find. Even just sensing her soul would be very difficult, with all the madness vibrating throughout the landscapes and her soul wavelength barricaded from the sight of outside forces by the protection of a witch's advanced soul protect spell.

"Cah!"

"Krah! Krah!"

"Coo~"

She quickly looked up as many different kinds of birds flew out of the trees in large groups, startled and alarmed. The sour smell of smoke in the air wafted towards her. Kana froze a little bit, and she started to tear up with golden tears.

"Something's happened" a French accent slipped from between her lips, "what are you all running from?" As she looked up some of her amethyst,dark Violet bangs got into her pale blue eyes, Kana flicked the hair out of her face with trembling fingers, as she looked down puzzled. Many of the birds and other animals had already started to clear from the area due to Asura's presence and the mass destruction caused by team Arachnophobia's soul powered canons and. . . Now the last of them are running from something new.

"Here I am just sitting in the brush, lost, the Kishin is only a few miles away, while all this horrible stuff is going on...and I can't do anything."

Kana Hope is the youngest out of the group. She is 13 years old and is very timid and shy, even around her friends. Her actions are unique in her own recognizable way, moving slowly and fluidly. Delicate, similar to a ballet dancer or a ghost ... though, she sometimes has an unbearable and noticeable urge to rub her hands together if not holding something. Kana is tall for her age, standing at around 5'5, and it is unlikely that she will grow much more. Her voice is whispery, airy, and light. When talking in a somber or more serious voice she might sound a bit tired, it may even sound scratchy and worn. Notably, Kana does get frightened a lot. Gasping when surprised frequently, and when absolutely frightened her screams are comparable to a shrill whistle.

Kana lived in France for most of her life, so French is her native tongue. She has found, though, that if she openly uses her accent or native language it directs more attention to herself. And attention directed at her is a big N O. So because of that she would rather not use her native language or accent at all. To keep eyes and ears away she tries her hardest to mimic average plain American accents or just not speak at all. She slips up often, slurring words or getting caught up in sentences when trying to focus on controlling her speech patterns. Kana always makes it seem like it's a much bigger problem than it needs to be. Kana Hope is a Meister.

The smell of thick smoke and a small growing fire in the distance started to cover the area as wind blew it more towards Kana and the others at their little circular clearing of the jungle. More birds started to take to the skies, leaving the danger zone.

Camo and GreenPaw lifted their heads toward the dark red sky, becoming alert; and the both of them became extremely distressed.

"GreenPaw and Camo might be able to track down Kana." Mike tipped. His voice was solid. It doesn't waver even when as nerved as he was now by the bothering new news on Kana's disappearance. Rarely his voice is sincerely sweet or warm, and when he wants to sound angered or threatening then his voice is indeed dark and weighty. His vocal tones are like elastic, and he manages to maintain a lot of expression and youth like qualities in his voice when happy and pleased.

"I-I can't." GreenPaw said uncomfortably, still looking up.

"Hmn, that's funny. I could recall a certain green-haired girl claiming she was the best scent tracker in the whole Tribe?" Jackalin said in a snarky voice.

"No, I-"

Jackalin cut GreenPaw off," lost your scent of smell?"

GreenPaw became angry and stomped her foot down on the ground with a snarl. "I can't track Kana down because of the smell of the smoke! Can't you see it!? There's a fire!" The thick shroud started to settle around them as it contaminated the air, and slowly started to choke their lungs. An Angel pulled the collar of her shirt up over her mouth and nose and held it there to keep from breathing it in too much. Domanick, Dustin, Mike, and Jackalin did the same. But GreenPaw and Camo did not have any available material to follow the other's leads and protect themselves.

"A fire? Who the hell started a fuckin' fire in the middle of this catastrophe!?" Jackalin said a bit muffled by her shirt.

"It must have been caused by one of the blasts from that cannon Arachnophobia was using, the wind must have helped start it up, quick come in closer! Stay away from the trees and brush; the center will be safer if the fire gets too close to us." An waved her free hand in, motioning the others towards her in the center of the clearing.

"I can't... believe this..." Camo spoke out in a disgusted tone; he made no effort to protect himself from the increasing white smoke. "First, Arachnophobia builds their base here, disturbing the land's wildlife. Then they destroy the earth, plants, and animals with their lasers and weapons also bringing Death City here to wrestle on top of the homes of thousands of innocent souls like it was their personal play mat. And now they've set fires? To finish off the rest?!" He got increasingly angry. GreenPaw stood her ground next to him.

"This is complete disrespect! I refuse to stand here and do nothing as my home and thousands of other's gets choked out by smoke and burned to dust! The D.W.M.A and Arachnophobia can go slit their throats somewhere else! - they can just leave our land out of it!" GreenPaw barked.

"An, I respect you. Do not get me wrong but this is not okay in any way with me, personally. I'm not going to stand with you and the others here anymore while watching everything around us get wasted, pretending we can't do a damn thing to stop it."

"Alright, Camo... I understand... Maybe there is something we can do right now." – An Angel stopped covering her face to become clearer despite the risks – "Kana is still out there too, she might be closer to the fire and she might be in danger. Even if she's in a completely safe spot, a lot of this jungle is in danger, too. I recognize that, believe me, I do."

"Thank you for understanding, GreenPaw and I will be back as fast as we can."

"Just you two? The both of you alone in a growing fire? No way, we have to do this together. You don't know how big this fire is."

" It can't be that large by now. This is literally a rain forest, everything's wet. That's why the smoke is so thick and white." GreenPaw shrugged wanting to leave without further question, fully aware of the dangers and convinced that she and Camo can handle it.

"GreenPaw, we will all help." An turned to the others who, although not so enthusiastically, showed their support too.

"I could have sworn you said she was right behind us not even a couple of minutes ago!" Dustin whispered to Domanick as the others followed An, she was quickly finding a stick and walking to a soft dirt area of the clearing. Mike held one as well, already using it to draw a diagram in the ground. It was a simple, scribbled model of where the Kishin dome was and where the strange upright version of Death City was.

"Dustin, that was an hour ago you need to work on getting her back now." His brother hissed back through his teeth, to be polite as the others planned things out. He was not willing to argue about Kana anymore, what done was done. The show must go on.

Mike stood up from where he was kneeling down.

"Camo, do you know if there are any large rivers or streams near here?"

"No. Just trickles of water here and there, small ponds where it pools up. If you look in the caves, a lot of water has collected in there, too. Do you mean underground rivers?-" Camo began to ramble.

"-TMI, Camo-" he rolled his eye slightly "-come over here and just tell me where you think some of those rivers are, compared to our map." Mike handed over his stick to Camo so he could mark out the locations.

"Can't put out the fire if we can't find a large enough source of water." Jackalin said.

"What are we supposed to use to carry the water from the streams to the fires?" Dustin whispered to himself as he leaned over An's shoulders to look at what was being done.

"I didn't think about that." An replied.

"We can kick up dirt and stomp the fires out if we can't find a close enough stream. Camo should have some empty jars with him, we can use those for water." GreenPaw assured.

"The stream should run through these two points here. If the fire started in this location, since that's the way the wind is blowing it towards us, then we could stop there." Camo was using his fingers to draw in wavy lines signifying water and drew smoke like cloud shapes were he thought the fire was coming from.

"But wait, An, we can't all go. Kana's lost in the jungle. Do you think she'd know how to find us, or avoid the fire and without getting caught by wandering D.W.M.A members?" Jackalin said, suddenly showing empathy.

"You're right, do you think Mike and you could retrace our path through the jungle? She might still be stuck somewhere on the trail we took." An stood up from her kneeling position.

"Yeah, we can handle that. Right, Mike?"

"We can find Kana, no problem."

"An, maybe Camo and I should be the only ones to go put out the fire. We can handle this ourselves. You should go help find Kana." An Angel looked GreenPaw in the eyes with a slightly confused expression. GreenPaw put her hand on An's left shoulder. "I just think it might be faster this way. The fire can't be too big already, I promise we'll be fine."

"No way, I'm the captain of this team. I decide what's going to-" Domanick cut her off.

"An. I think this might be better. Camo and GreenPaw know where the fire is, and it should be relatively small still. We don't know where Kana is... so we need more people to spread out in search."

"Oh..." she trailed off. An felt awkward butterflies in her chest and stomach. "How embarrassing... a leader being corrected by her whole team... I want to disappear.." her thoughts echoed.

"I'm sorry, An. We got this, okay? We'll be safe. Ready GreenPaw?"

"Yeah." GreenPaw nodded back to Camo before looking to An, reinsuring her that, "we got this."

Without further discussion, the two bolted out of the clearing and pushed past large leaves and thick foliage, running from the rest of the team and towards the forest fire. Their steps pounding on the hard-packed ground, amazingly, while avoiding stomping on flowers and small forms of life. With quick, inhuman speed and precise footing, GreenPaw and Camo's advantage made them the fastest possible two to make it to the growing fire.

GreenPaw's feet a blur, she took lead in front of Camo as their forms altered. Exceeding an average person's capability. No longer actually human.

"Okay, we should follow the foot trail back the way we came. Once we get to about where we were an hour ago, branch off. Jackalin and Mike could go look right, off the trail, An and Dustin and I could go left." Domanick advised. "It's probably were Dustin and I lost her."

"I like that idea." Dustin added in, much happier than before. An looked down a bit. She folded her arms and put most of her weight on her left foot.

"Yeah, that'll work too." Jackalin said as she already started heading back towards the path where they all had come from.

"It's all settled then." Mike agreed, following his Meister.

Kana won't be so easily found. She had accidentally gotten off trail and was able to move much faster on her own than the others predicted, so much so that she was closer to the fire by the time she got stuck.

She choked on the smoke, coughing into her arm, her eyes were closed tightly shut making sure nothing got into them.

The wet crunching of feet stepping around foliage squished nearby, hurried but sloppy and scared. Kana, noticing the approaching steps, kept her mouth and nose covered with her arm sleeve. Obstructing as much smoke as she can from getting into her lungs- hoping it would keep her from making a sound. The smoke was already making her nose and throat burn. Coughing was starting to severely hurt and became more violent, even though muffled, it could be heard easily.

"Cribbit cribbit." A person said in a tired voice, they stopped running and halted in front of Kana without even noticing her. The Arachnophobia clock they wore was tattered and torn; her face was smudged with dirt. She fell to her knees, weak from inhaling so much smoke while running, keeping most of herself up with her free arm and coughing into the other. Looking up with wet eyes, they caught Kana's- now open. Both staring at each other face-to-face with confusion, the kind that surprises you so much you feel it in your chest and at the base of your throat.

"Eruka!" A large man jumped from the near distance over some bushes in a matching scrapped up robe. "We need to leave quick-"his voice trailed off as he followed Eruka's gaze to confusion turning to aggression. "Hey! Who are you?!"

Kana's expression went straight to outright fear, trembling as light gold tears flooded the sides of her eyes, flowing over her lower lids streaming down her cheeks, soaking into her black sleeve that was still pressed against her mouth and noise protecting her from the smoke.

"Hey! Kid, I'm talking to you!"

Kana flinched and folded over, cowering, covering the back of her head and neck with her free hand.

"Free... she's just a child. She looks weak, and we need to get out of here quickly. Even if she is a D.W.M.A student, I doubt she'll be able to stop us." Eruka wobbled a bit, weak in the knees, as she stood up. She grabbed onto Free's upper arm to keep balance.

"Right,"-Free laughed-"I doubt she could. Because I'm immortal" he smirked, then coughed and sputtered in a quick fit.

"But you're not immune to all this smoke." Eruka croaked.

Free waved his hand in the hazy shroud in front of his face, trying to keep it out of his way- which was a waste of effort.

"Yeah, you're right, I've never had to deal with this much smoke, ever. Not even severe campfire smoke; even from before my imprisonment. Man, do I miss cooking things over a fire. But this is getting real annoying. Let's finally blow this place. I think we may be far enough from Arachnophobia and where most of the D.W.M.A students are." They both started to turn and walk away from Kana, starting to search for a good tree to climb to reach the canopy and attempt to escape to safety.

Kana feeling desperate looked back up and reached out in their direction. Her face still wet and starting to become smudged with the collective dust and ash of the growing fire.

"N-No, wait. . . Please! You can't leave me all alone, stuck like this. . ." She said hoarsely, her throat incredibly dry. Kana did not care about following An's rules at this point. Kana was more concerned about saving her life... or at least waiting to die with the comfort of other people around with her, instead of dying and disappearing alone.

Eruka stopped and turned her head sharply, looking back at Kana from the side.

"Are you going to confess to us who you are? I'm not saving one of Lord Death's faithful students. A death like your's wouldn't hang over my conscious." Free said over his right shoulder.

Kana looked away from Free, being much more intimidated by him and collected herself before looking and directing her answer to Eruka.

"M-My name is Kana... Pl-Please, I swear, I am not with the D.W.M.A... Just help me, please..." More shiny tears rolled down her face.

"You're not a student there?" Eruka replied puzzled because she had assumed that Kana, being a child, had come along with the city.

Kana shudders a bit, hoping she wouldn't regret her decisions of trusting these two strangers with this information. She shook her head "no", confirming to Eruka.

"Please, I'm stuck, I can't get up by myself... Don't leave me here to be found by the school, I'll get in serious trouble..." Kana's accent became more prevalent.

Only about 20 minutes back into the thick brush had passed. An, her weapons, Jackalin and Mike pushed large leaves aside while being careful to step over large roots and plants. They held their shirt collars up over their mouths and noses to keep the light smoke from being breathed in.

"Here, let's just split up now." Domanick said suddenly walking towards what looked like a natural fork in the path. He turned back to the others while holding onto the side of a tree trunk for steadiness, still covering his face with the other hand. " I'm alright with that."An Angel agreed,she stopped and grabbed something from her pocket.

"This." She paused." Is a whistle." everyone looked at her as if she was going to say more about it. Jackalin shrugged, "So?"

"What kind of whistle?" Mike asked.

"Oh It's just a whistle. A plain old whistle. Except for the fact that it's loud, like, really loud. It was the only one I grabbed,I wasn't thinking clearly, I should have thought of bringing more- but, if you hear this... that means we need to leave. You'll be able to hear this over all of the noise here in the jungle, that means get to me quick, and I mean quick. And if you guys can hear it that also means any D.W.M.A staff working out here or students nearby can hear it too. I'm not going to wait long. If you don't show up we will leave without you. It's not something I want to do, but I will in order to get the rest of the team to safety. If you can't find us, run. Run as far away from the jungle as possible, and be fast if you have to. Find the nearest town or city,find some way to get back home or to call me and I will come get you. We cannot risk being found and yet we've already taken too many." An held the silver whistle up. " Please don't put me in the situation of leaving my own team mates behind." She closed the whistle in her fist and brought it back down into her pocket. " We're on a time limit here, people. What makes it even more difficult is that we don't know how long we have."

"Gives us even more motivation to find Kana quickly, then." Mike tugged on Jackalin's wrist. "C'mon." The two of them took off, running and pushing past some large palm like leaves. With the distant sound of twigs and branches snapping and whipping back, they were out of sight.

"Great, we'll go this way then." Dustin said smiling, An nodded as Domanick helped her up and over a large log in their path."GreenPaw and Camo hopefully know about the whistle."

"Don't worry, Camo knows about my whistle." An Angel assured.

The amount of smoke was steadily, but thankfully, getting less severe. Down by the fire GreenPaw and Camo were trying to put it out. A large, reptilian, foot came down on a small, knee-height, grass fire; stomping it in then kicking some dirt onto it. A frighteningly large Lizard stood above it like a movie prop. The giant creature stood at the height of a dairy cow, appearing to be a Komodo Dragon but way too big. It's likeness being more Megalania, a dinosaur, who's closest living relative being the Komodo Dragon, was a more appropriate title. It's coloring is a bright and vibrant yellow, with red striping and accents. Their large tongue flicked out and in.

"There may be people near." GreenPaw said lowering her head from sniffing the air. She stood behind the beast."The scent, it doesn't smell familiar. We'll need to hurry just in case." She turned away from it. Her body started to shift and seemingly got caught in a blur. Her paw tattoo glowed with a green power. First the eyes, then her teeth changed, her nails grew longer and thicker, her ankles elongated, ears turned to a point,and a tail covered in green fur sprouted from the base of her spine. Most of her body fat had also turned into hard muscle during the process, mostly within the abs. The glowing and blur disappeared. GreenPaw had become what appeared to be a werewolf."Got that?" She looked over her shoulder.

The Reptile took a cautious step backwards,to slightly turn and face GreenPaw. On it's shoulder,now visible, was a tattoo of a gecko holding a rounded leaf in it's tail. "Got it."

An, Domanick and Dustin got to a clearing in their path. It had seemed they were on a slightly more elevated part of the jungle, and they could see the Kishin's dome and Death City almost perfectly. They towered over this area of the jungle. This urged An to stop.

"What's wrong?" Domanick asked as he stopped and walked over to her. Her expression looked pained, but as he came over she quickly looked down and away from him.

"Nothing..."

"Well it's obviously not nothing." Dustin walked to her left side as Domanick stood at her right.

"I... I just don't know what to do anymore. All before- All before,up till now, we've had a plan. It wasn't even our own, we were given this plan. But now everything's been all thrown off. And I just- I just don't understand." She drifted off, tearing up."I'm failing."

Dustin smiled sweetly."What do you mean? I'm sure we can handle this. We always have. Our plan, before, way way earlier got a little screwy because of Kana but- we fixed it, we worked our way around that. We can work around this too."

"Like you said before, we can try and call in Holda and Leveret, they're the most powerful witches we know. We'll get to the kids, defeat the Kishin, save them and the world, become heroes." Domanick placed his hand on An's shoulder.

"You two don't understand, I wasn't actually serious about asking for their help..." As An said this Domanick frowned." I just said that to shut everyone up and get them to calm down, but that still didn't really work. Our rules come first, we can't associate ourselves with the mission anymore! The D.W.M.A have involved themselves way too far into this! We-we aren't supposed to come up with a plan B... we weren't assigned a plan B... what we're doing" some tears rolled down her cheeks from the panic and embarrassment "it isn't aloud. We broke the rules! I can't continue the mission anymore! We can't continue anymore... we lost." two more tears rolled down here cheeks as she was trying her hardest to maintain her posture, instead of bursting into tears and crawling into a little ball; to disappear forever in. Her lower lip quivered, as she stubbornly held her expression.

Dustin's smile disappeared."No, no. Don't say that." His smile slightly returned.

"We- we are not aloud to interfere with D.W.M.A students..." she desperately said back.

"Screw the rules! If we don't do something, anything, they'll die!" Domanick strongly demanded.

" We're not going to be breaking anymore rules! We are going to find Kana, and then go as a group to get GreenPaw and Camo. Then we're leaving." Upset by this Dustin took a few steps away from An and his brother's argument. The visibility in the area was almost back to normal, as the smoke started to clear.

Domanick sighed then composed himself."Look." He said a bit calmer."An... we have to do something. HAVE. students will die. Kid... your reaper, he will be murdered. Hell, if we don't do something now there's a chance that when the Kishin emerges that he'll be powerful enough to consume us all!"

" In a situation like this I am not supposed to act! Kid's in danger, I know that. But because I don't know he'll die for sure... that's why Lord Death's orders are still stronger than me wanting to help. I can't physically DO anything." She was as confused as when she first watched the shield finish closing. An had already gone through everything in her memory that could count as a loophole to try and save them. She's already done what she could do at the moment. Besides being a currently useless Fallen Angel, An was only a had only been about 2 years since she started this job on Earth. Scared to admit it, she had no idea what she was doing.

An, closing her eyes, tried again. Recounting finally a moment,a memory. The first thing that naturally drifted to her mind.

Lord Death was before her, she remembered. He looked awesome in her presence, it had only been one of the few first times they had met. His mask wasn't as soft and friendly as when it was the first time they met.

"One of the most important things you have to remember is keeping the branch secret. You can not allow yourself to become caught under the suspicion of my students. And with this newest incident...frankly, I'd rather you and your students stay hidden from the sight of any Death City citizen. Beside the individuals I say are alright, of course. We can't have everything crashing down upon what we built, especially now. Don't assume this isn't hard for me too. It isn't easy keeping so many things away from Kiddo." Lord Death's voice was deep, but filled with caring emotion.

"But what if we have to? Like there's no other option?" An said quietly and very shy.

"What do you mean by 'have to'?"

" Well... what if he was in front of me, and he was in danger.. I don't think I could control myself. Can I help Kid then? Am I aloud, in that case, to at least reveal myself?" Lord Death listened to An but was quite for a long period. " I'm sorry, Sir. If-If I said something wron-"

"Then you only help if he asks you to." Lord Death answered her while cutting An off. Slightly embarrassed she folded her hands behind her back and looked at the ground. "Until he learns about you, you will have to follow what I say." He paused for a second " And one more thing, there will be a change of plans."

Surprised, An quickly lifted her head."A change?!"

"Yes. I had had it in mind, but due to recent events it looks like I decided to switch some things around. You know how I wanted your-" Lord Death was interrupted by a ringing on his mirror."Oh my..." he trailed off.

"Oh no! What do I do?! I can't be seen!" An panicked.

"It's okay, just hurry down the isle. If you're fast they wont catch a glimpse of you." His mask smoothed out and became a lot nicer looking. An nodded."Now, never mind what I said. Let Death Scythe in, he should be at the door or at least soon. This call is very important."

The sound of An's shoes clicking, as she ran toe heal down the walkway of guillotines, faded.

Suddenly a realization came to An." Wait.. Oh no..nonono.." She thought aloud as her eyes got a bit wider. She continued her panic internally, "is this it? Is this the change Lord Death wanted? The 'change'? How-but why didn't he call me back and tell me he wanted his students to defeat the Kishin!? Instead of us, but why? I suddenly feel hallow inside, my gut... it's gross. Is it not our time to be revealed to the world? No, he couldn't have possibly planned this... This had to have happened by accident... Why did he tell me to act like he didn't change the plan!? He changed the plans!" She screamed inside.

"An..." Domanick grew worried."What is it?"

"I. I think, um. Maybe we were never meant to be here in the first place." she said with confusion and sadness. An blankly stared ahead of her, towards Death City and the glowing dome.

"What?! But we've all been training for this since the day you've arrived!" Dustin bursted in.

Domanick coughed in disbelief." Why would it be those regular students and not us? We're supposed to kill Asura. Lord Death needed to get rid of him for good and we needed to make right with the world. That's been the world needs to know that people like us, us things, that we can do good too! This was supposed to be the huge shocking headline tomorrow morning, humans reading that monsters saved the world."

"We can't stop, you're not giving up for real, are you?"

"No... I'll never give up on delivering that message. It's a truth humans need to face, they're not the only ones on this planet. I just... I just can't do this- what you're asking me to do right now is impossible! We were not supposed to save the world..."

At the fire's location, there was now only charred wood and the last of the hazy smoke was slowly being blown away. All of the fire successfully put out. Camo stood there, his eyes were still very reptilian shaped. A great deal of the yellow and red scales were still covering his more human appearing body. A long, heavy looking tail hung low to the ground behind him.

"Finally, looks like we're done. I think we actually managed to save quite a bit more than I first expected." GreenPaw looked at him and smiled with a mouthful of sharp canine like teeth.

Camo nodded his head, but looked a bit unsettled. "Did you see him?"

"See who?"

"Another one... dead." He reached into one of his over-sized cargo pant pockets, pulling out a small glass jar.

"What?" GreenPaw gasped with disbelief. She hurried past Camo looking around. "Where did you find him?"

"Back a little further, the poor thing must have been asleep, curled up in the grass. He doesn't have much burns, probably died from breathing in all the smoke."

Tucked within some burnt grass, curled up in a contorted shape, was a young male Red Brocket Deer covered in white ash.

"This will be the 6th jar we've filled so far." GreenPaw whispered as she took the jar from Camo, turning the lid." I hope that, by doing this, we can give as many of them as we can find a new chance to live.. just a little bit longer, at least."

"I've always thought this was the most we could possibly do. Their souls will find new homes soon." Camo placed his hands on GreenPaw's shoulders from behind.

"And a companion who will truly appreciate their existence." GreenPaw walked over and knelt down in front of the small deer. Using her sharp thumb nail, she made a deep incision across one of the arteries on his neck. Blood didn't come out as fast or well, considering the heart of the animal had been still for a while now. But resting the jar up to the cut managed to fill up a quarter of it. GreenPaw closed the jar's lid tightly, looking at the thick substance- it was like dark, red dyed cough syrup. Camo took the jar from her, placing it back in one of his many pockets. You could her the clank of other small jars as he buttoned the pocket back up.

An, Domanick and Dustin were still in their small clearing. Domanick had An sitting down on a thick fallen branch; her cheeks, nose and eyes a bit red and her eyelashes wet.

"I've been so-so stupid." She cried into her hands.

"Shhhh, shhhh. Don't cry An, please don't cry. D-Don't." Dustin hushed An while struggling to keep himself together as well.

Domanick looked toward his brother, and thought to himself " too much emotion. I guess I have to be strong for the both of us." He sat down right next to An, placing his hand on her shoulder.

"Please, just try to explain to us what happened. You can tell us, you're our Meister, and you're like a little sister too. For whatever reason it is, we won't be mad at you.. or disappointed, or upset in any way."

An rubbed her eyes with her suit sleeve for a couple of minutes, every time she felt she was decent enough to talk another drip or two of tears rolled down her cheeks. Domanick finally took her hand before she rubbed her face raw. Feeling embarrassed An looked down.

" ... Lord Death, a while ago, a long while ago when he was first explaining to me the plan; he had told me that even before Kana's accident that he was having thoughts about changing our plans but once that had happened he was certain he wanted to change... to just change everything." She hiccuped while trying to keep from crying. "But before he could get into any details at all his mirror started ringing, and Lord Death told me to forget it and to just leave before I was seen. It was probably a conference because he told me to let Death Scythe in, too... once I made it to the door. I probably could have hidden behind the mirror, but I guess it must have been a long meeting that I wasn't supposed to hear." An shuddered hard as she breathed out a long sigh. This didn't feel right, it was painting Lord Death like he was a bad person. To do so was practically blasphemous.

Dominick looked angry. "Forget about it? Was those his exact words!?"

"Well, no! No no... He told me to never-mind it..." She defended.

"Well that's basically the same fucking thing." He crossed his arms and looked off in the other direction. His jaw was clenched tight, and it was obvious that he was starting to become way more than simply angry. " I can't believe he didn't even call you back to elaborate what the hell was going on."

An silently cried a bit more, the sides of her lips twitched a little to keep from frowning in complete devastation. She wiped the couple tears away that were clinging to the top of her cheeks. " ... I shou... I should've called back myself. Maybe he didn't realize we were still continuing the original plan? Maybe... What he meant by to 'just not mind it' was to stop completely? To not mind the whole situation. I just misunderstood and thought he meant he wasn't going to put his new plan to action..." Dustin took hold of An's hand, placing his other hand over her's, cupping it comfortingly.

Dominick stood up. "No, stop that. I'm not letting you blame yourself for this mess. He's the adult, he's a god damn Reaper for Heaven's sake! He should take responsibility! He's a damn bastard for this." An covered her ears in response.

" Domanick, don't you think you're being a bit too rash?" He side hugged An, pulling her closer. An tightly shut her eyes and kept her ears covered, trying to be as still as possible.

" I don't care, Dustin. I understand, she's a slave to his commands but we're not. I'm going to say and do what I can to protect her. An could never see through such a masquerade and even if she could... there's nothing she could do." He calmed downed a bit. "But we can. It is completely wrong for him to do this to her, to do this to all of us. I know Lord Death is a reaper, granted, he should be respected. It doesn't mean he's always right, or knows what's best. How old is he? About a 1,000? He's an elder. But you know what, Dustin? People with power can mess up too, adults make mistakes all the time."

Dustin sighed in agreement. "I suppose." Dustin let go of An, and tried to get her to bring her hands back down- which she easily let happen; but her eyes remained closed.

" An... We won't force you to do anything. I know it's physically impossible for you to help, but Dustin and I can. Please... Give us your mirror. I want to call Leverette and Holda." Domanick held out his hand.

" But..." She finally opened her eyes and looked up at him.

" Don't worry, you'll stay right here and sit. You won't be involved. We're not going to force you into this anymore, you're free to sit on the sidelines so you don't break any more rules." Domanick said. An was deeply hurt by hearing this, both of her weapons completely disobeying her orders. Pained, she creates eye-contact with Dustin as her last resort, hoping he'd comply.

" I.. I'm sorry An." It was hard for him to look at her like that. " It's just ... we're your weapons, I want to help protect you and make sure the best is done for you. If Lord Death did this on purpose I don't understand how it could of possibly had been the best." Domanick lowered his hand as Dustin stood up next to him. In a much more comforting tone, he then put out his own hand and also asked for the mirror. " It's for good..."

'For good' it kind of stung. " I..." An looked down at her side. " I can't move my hand. You'll have to take it from my pocket." Her voice cracked as she finished,her feelings were so conflicted that at that moment her emotions decided to shut off. She looked completely neutral, and looked away from them both. Stubbornly threatening the possibility that she may not ever forgive them for this.

Dustin took his hand back and couldn't bare to reach into her pant pocket. Domanick didn't hesitate and bent down to reach into her pocket and grab a small, light, silver hand mirror. .

Eruka was untangling thorns and trying to pull Kana out of the predicament she had landed in. Although most of the smoke had been cleared Kana was still very panicked, her breathing was rapid and escalating. " I can't be I can't be found we can't let them find us we can't let them" she repeated over in her head as she began to hyperventilate.

Shocked by Kana's increasing ill state, Eruka worked faster. "She's shaking-...how bad of an enemy must she be if she's this afraid of being caught by the DWMA?" Eruka thought to herself. Quickly she paused to take her cloak off, revealing the dotted dress she was wearing underneath, throwing it behind her to get it out of the way.

"Here!" She stopped " Please, if you calm down a second and take my hand now.. maybe I can pull you out?" Eruka said this with her hand to Kana's but was still unsure.

Free was standing on a very high branch above the two, thankfully for them a lot of the canopy had been destroyed in that part of the jungle. He stood there with his hold on the side of the trunk, looking out at the clear view of Death City and the ruins of Arachnophobia, his cloak hung on a small branch next to him. To Free, it looked like they were still safe, there was no one around and he was planning their escape.

" Aha!" Free heard Eruka shout, he looked down at them. Eruka and Kana were both on their knees, Kana seemed to be hugging tightly around Eruka's waist; and not knowing how to respond to the act of gratitude, Eruka simply just patted Kana's back softly with an awkward smile on her face.

Then, suddenly, there was a change. Everything became bright as the dark clouds overhead became faint until they completely disappeared, the red sky turned blue and the madness vanished.

This, of course, snapped Free's attentions right back to the dome.

" It's... Dissipating..." He managed to speak, breathless.


End file.
